INTRODUCTION

          The jurisdiction of the Provincial Court from 1675 onward continued un-
        changed. Criminal cases involving life or limb, and civil cases where the
        amount involved was 3000 pounds of tobacco or more, had to originate there.
        In smaller cases the Provincial Court and the county courts had equal juris-
        diction, and the Provincial Count did not hesitate to hear and determine very
        minor cases. John Baker sued Arthur Carleton for one hundred and eight
        pounds of tobacco, and the Court heard the case, granted Baker what he had
        sued for, and also 579 pounds for costs of suit (post, p. 221). A hundred
        and eight pounds of tobacco was less than a pound sterling. The litigious inn-
        holder, Garnet Vansweringen (he was plaintiff in twenty-seven cases), sued
        Benjamin Cloyster in assumpsit for 240 pounds of tobacco for liquors and
        accommodations, and recovered the 240 pounds and his costs (post, p. 223). Al-
        though the High Court of Chancery had been separated from the Provincial
        Count in 1669, the Provincial Count did not hesitate to exercise equity func-
        tions, especially in land cases (post, pp. 5-8, 49, 193, 288, 289).1
          In the years covered by this volume, 1675 to 1677, the justices of the Pro-
        vincial Court were, as they had been, members of the Upper House, members
        of the Council, justices of the High Court of Chancery and of the Probate
        Court. Since they held office, not for a term, but at the pleasure of the Proprie-
        tary, they were subject to his domination. Understandably, it is sometimes
        hard to know in what capacity a man of many offices was acting. All of the
        justices were large landholders, and most of them held lucrative offices not
        connected with the Court. Governor Charles Calvert, who was also chief jus-
        tice, became himself the Proprietary upon the death of his father Cecilius
        (post, p. 265). He remained in the province for some time and continued
        to serve as chief justice. When, in June 1676, he was about to leave for
        England, he appointed his infant son Cecil to be governor and chief justice of
        the Provincial Count; and as his deputy, to exercise the powers of the offices, he
        named Col. Jesse Wharton, who was already a justice and member of the
        Council, and already ill. In his instructions to Wharton, dated, like the com-
        mission, on June 16, 1676, he ordered him, if he found himself “sicke or in
        danger at any time of death” to “take care . . . to appoint Our trusty and
        welbeloved ffriend Thomas Notley Gentleman to Succeed” him; and he gave
        to Notley in that case all the powers he had given Wharton. On July 27, 1676,
        the ailing deputy governor, in pursuance of his instructions, did thus commis-
        sion and empower Notley, and when, on August 1, 1676, the Council met,
        Wharton was dead and Notley took over as governor and as chief justice
        (Archives, XV, pp. 105-1 i8). He was sworn in as deputy governor on July 27,

         ‘The history of the Provincial Court is not treated here, for it has so often been told before.
        It may be sought in the works of Bozman, Thomas, Newbold, Steiner and Judge Carroll T.
        Bond, and in the introductions to past volumes of the Archives, especially volumes XLIX, LI,
        LIII and LVII.